The Man and the Monster
by Creative Destruction
Summary: A story of shame, sin, and growing up.
1. The Myth

**A Note to Readers, No Matter the Myth to Which They Subscribe**

_The Man and the Monster _will not make sense to you if you attempt to fit it cleanly into the timeline of the television series. That is because it is fanfiction.

There comes a certain point where certain characters and premises have already been established, where anything added is not connected to an overarching plot but instead contributes to the mythology of whatever it may be. A character such as Batman has been around for so long that a litany of literature has been written and a number of movies in which he is protagonist. The comics of today can connected to the comics of the past only very vaguely, so different are they in style, plot, and tone. Neither the first movie nor _Batman Begins_ are even particularly coherent when any attempt at direct connection is made, and yet it is undeniable that they are both Batman movies. This is because, while they are not sequels or part of a series, they are myths that have been contributed to the culture of Batman.

In the end, that is what we are doing here. We are making myths. This is a notable and often underestimated endeavor—"fanfiction" has always been somewhat of a dirty word in literary circles, by those who choose not to understand it or its potential.

In a similar vein as the famous comics, Animes have frequently indulged in a strange yet interesting practice. For every television series, there is a manga, and the differences between the two vary from inconsequential to bafflingly vast. On top of that, there is a tradition of making movies which make absolutely no sense in the timeline of either, yet stand solidly on their own and can be quite entertaining.

So without apology, I will not be setting this in a specific time in _Inuyasha_ the television series. I will take things from the anime and from the manga as I find necessary, and I think that any fan will find my work entirely easy to understand. At the same time, understand that attempting to inform me of inaccuracies or deviations from the authentic _Inuyasha_ will be mostly met with indifference.

A script for a potential episode is not what you will find here.

What you _can_ expect to find is the myth as I have told it.

The myth of Inuyasha the man, and Inuyasha the monster.

I ask only that you judge it for what it is, rather than what you might want it to be.


	2. The Stone of Essense

**The Stone of Essence**

"What a strange thing, that all my travels should bring me upon this savage land of the orient," murmured the peculiar little man, as he wandered through the village. The villagers, hard at work in their fields of wet rice, could not help but stare. He was strange to their eyes; his skin more tanned, his hair a lighter brown, and his eyes a blue they hadn't known was possible. He was also short, stout, and bald—all in all, a curious fellow to eyes of villagers in Sengoku Jidai Japan.

"They will learn though, oh yes, I know that they can, it has sustained me through far more remote corners than this, it certainly will not be any trouble here," he continued on, unaware of or indifferent to his ever-increasing audience, "no, they will all see, yes, for I will show them—no, no, no, it will show them, but _I_ will show them with it. The…the men will rape, the women will strangle their babes, the children will claw and bite and trample, and…"

"Excuse me." One man, volunteered by his wife, called to the stranger.

"And…and there will be…"

"Sir? Is there something you're looking for?"

"There will be…will…be…" the foreigner turned to face the villager, his lips curved into a small smile and a spark of gleeful anticipation in his eyes.

"I think that you had better be on your way," the villager said forcefully, feeling ill at ease. A small, round, grey stone in the stranger's hand began to glow a deep yellow, and he clasped his hand tightly around it.

"There will be a reckoning! A salvation! An uncluttering! A cleansing!" He laughed, as the wet rice fields were already becoming thick with human blood.

Inuyasha arrived to a burning city, attracted by the stench of violence and a sense of something he could not describe. "What is this, what is this?" came a small voice. The hanyou drew Tetsusaiga from its sheath and thrust it up to the neck of the newcomer.

"Who the hell are you!" He snarled.

"Who am I?" The strange man replied, "Who _am_ I? Who are any of us, really?"

"You are one crazy-phrase away from losing your head," Inuyasha threatened.

"Well, if it's a name that you require, I suppose you might call me Anaxagoras, although I doubt you would get the joke," came the answer.

"The only joke is you still being alive," the impatient dog-demon growled, "now tell me what you did here."

"And why would you think that I had anything to do with this…this…"

"Cut the crap. I smelled it. You were here, and then…they changed," Inuyasha interrupted, "you're changed, too. Kind of."

"You can smell that? Fascinating."

"I asked you a question, and I'm starting to feel less like waiting for answers and more like avenging these people," Inuyasha snapped, "a weak human like you shouldn't push his luck so much."

"The Stone of Essence."

"What the hell?"

"An explanation? Once it was thought that all there was was one, and then there were those who thought that instead there was many. The gatekeepers of history have told us that there is many and that to everything there is an essence, that which makes something what it is. Yet upon discovering the stone, that which reveals the essence of all things, I find that it does not reveal the one true nature of everything, but merely simplifies. So I have come, from lands far, far to the west of here, traveling and simplifying everything so that we might go back to the one as all should be."

"Well, that makes a shit-ton of sense," Inuyasha sighed, "I guess I'll just be killing you, then."

"No you won't," Anaxagoras told him with confidence, backing away by a few steps.

"I won't?"

"No. You detest killing humans."

"And how would you know that?" Inuyasha snorted.

"Didn't you listen to a word I said?" Anaxagoras retorted, holding out a glowing stone between his thumb and forefinger.

"That's the stone you were babbling about?"

"The Stone of Essence. I went to a great deal of trouble to get a hold of it."

"A shame it's going to end up being pointless, with you being dead and all."

"Your sword. It has two natures." Anaxagoras observed.

"What?"

"There are two of it. How very interesting."

"Right. Would you two like to get more closely acquainted?"

"I think you should feel the weight of your conscience," Anaxagoras said with certainty, the glow of the Stone of Essence taking on greater intensity, "your humanity, your empathy, your burning guilt—all together they are you, and now you will become none other."

"What…what are you doing?" Inuyasha demanded, as he could feel his emotions shifting. More than that, his physical body began to feel inexplicably unlike anything he was used to.

"I waste no more words on a simpleton who does not listen," Anaxagoras told him with evident boredom, "but that sword of yours will be worth examining once the stone has made you my slave."

"Slave?" Inuyasha growled, struggling against the effects of the stone, "You…want Tetsusaiga?" He lifted the sword up above his head and moved to strike.

"We both know you aren't going to harm me," Anaxagoras sighed, holding the stone out further in front of him.

"Don't…don't have to hurt…_you_," Inuyasha roared, swinging down and connecting the mighty blade with the Stone of Essence. The explosion of light and power blinded them both, and a surge of pain, anger, and every desire that had every welled up inside of him began to flow through Inuyasha without filter or logic.

"What could have happened?" Anaxagoras asked himself, his head throbbing. He crawled around on all fours, searching for his precious possession. "Could he have destroyed the stone? Is it even possible? That which is one, the atom, the elementary sphere?" He stopped suddenly as a low growl erupted from behind him. Turning around slowly, he was met by the piercing glare of blood red eyes. The full girth of Tetsusaiga instantly pierced his torso, and the impaled man found himself lifted off the ground.

"Detest killing humans," a low and dangerous voice spat, "there will be nothing left of you for anyone to find, you disgusting bubble of fat." His heart still failing, the last sight that the curiosity known as Anaxagoras saw were clawed fingers making their way to his face.

When his companions found him, hours later, Inuyasha lay on the ground, clutching the untransformed Tetsusaiga.

And entirely human.


	3. Untainted

**Untainted**

"Jaken, take Rin and ride Ah-Un to a safe location far away from here," Sesshomarou said suddenly, silencing the constant chattering of his companions.

"Lord Sesshomarou?" the toad-youkai asked uncertainly.

"It is not appropriate for a servant to question his lord, Jaken," the taiyoukai remarked with a grim firmness, "do as you are instructed immediately."

"Ay…" his servant replied.

"Lord Sesshomarou?" the twelve-year-old human companion questioned nervously. She received no response, as the Lord of the Western Lands turned his back to them and made his departure from them in characteristic grace of movement. Expressing annoyance in order to mask his confusion, Jaken urged her on and they mounted the two-headed beast that would lead them away from an unperceived threat.

"I could have killed them…all three of them," came a low, snarling voice from the trees, "or four of them, if you count both heads of the lower beast."

"I had not known you had sunk so deeply into savagery," Sesshomarou stated flatly, "and I'm certain that you're in no position to be speaking of lower beasts." The response he received was a chuckle, almost a snicker, which contained in it a malice almost palpable.

"I could kill them even now, airborne though they might be."

"That you have such power in your present state is highly unlikely. Although this Sesshomarou was under the impression that you wouldn't be this articulate, either."

"Fool that you are, you mistake my situation. You can see for yourself that I have the power." With a loud noise, the object of Sesshomarou's attention revealed something rather out of the ordinary to the demon lord.

"How is it that you can wield that as you are now?"

"Tetsusaiga is a part of me, older brother, and it has shed its weaknesses just as I have myself."

"You speak nonsense."

"What I desire are resources. You have them and you will provide me with them. Or I will enjoy tearing you apart and bathing in your blood."

"Even if what you wanted was of any consequence, this Sesshomarou will never be intimidated by the petty threats of a tainted hanyou," the taiyoukai snorted, drawing Toukijin.

"Arrogant fool!" sneered the wicked creature. Sesshomarou braced for the impact of the massive sword as the burning red eyes drew nearer.

Inuyasha awoke with an odd sense of clumsiness and weight which were obscured only by the uncharacteristically powerful sting of a more familiar feeling of shame and self-loathing. As everything came into focus, he realized that he was in Kaede's hut, and Kagome was sitting next to him. "Inuyasha?" she said hopefully, her voice quieter than he was used to it being.

"What…what's…"

"You were gone for so long," she explained, "so after a while, we decided to go looking for you. We saw a big flash of light, and followed it to where it had happened, and then we found you…"

"What—what's going on!" Inuyasha demanded, looking at his hands in horror.

"That's what _I_ would like to know," Kagome said, bristling a little at the fact that he had left them all and gotten himself into trouble, "when we found you, you were out and there was a dead body near you. But it was…oh god, Inuyasha, it was so horrible…it barely looked _human_ any more."

"But…but what about _me_? Why am I…when did I?"

"You were human when we found you. What the heck happened, Inuyasha? Who was that person? Were you attacked by whatever it was that killed him?" Kagome asked, firing off all the questions she'd pent up while he had been unconscious.

"I think we _all_ have some questions we'd like answered," Miroku interrupted. They turned to look at him.

"Yes…of course," the newly human Inuyasha murmured.

"I'll go get Sango and the others," Kagome volunteered.

"I was going to either break the stone, or cut his hand off if I had to," Inuyasha said softly, "Tetsusaiga hit the stone, and…and that's the last thing I can remember."

"What an _awful_ story!" Kagome remarked, "He just went around making villagers kill one another?"

"It seems the circumstances were a little more complex than just that," Miroku mused, "but that is hardly the point. None of this explains how Anaxagoras met his particularly gruesome fate, or…"

"Or why I'm human." Inuyasha sighed.

"Indeed."

"What should we do?" Sango asked.

"I think you Kagome, Shippo, and Inuyasha should stay with Kaede," Miroku volunteered helpfully, "and see if she can find any useful information on this stone or on Inuyasha's condition."

"What about you?" Kagome asked.

"I want to go and look for that stone. See if it might still be where we found Inuyasha," he answered.

"Good idea," Sango agreed, "Kirara and I will accompany you. Her keen sense of smell should be of use to us."

"I'll come too." Inuyasha said.

"You are staying here."

"The hell I am!" he roared, in the first characteristic flare of temper since his awakening.

"Don't be a fool," Miroku scolded, "you're vulnerable right now, and you will stay here until we have a better idea of what happened."

"To hell with you, monk!" came the reply, behind dark glaring eyes, "I say I'm coming and I'm coming!"

"Inuyasha!" Kagome snapped, "Don't make me say 'it'!"

"You wouldn't," he gulped.

"Wouldn't I?"

"I would be pretty cool to see what happens when you do it to a human," Shippo observed with gleeful anticipation. This earned him a thump, but the argument was for all intents and purposes settled. Though invoking the threat and mentioning his present vulnerability had left Kagome with Inuyasha at the height of his pouting.

"_Kaze no Kizu!_"

Sesshomarou shielded himself with the blade born of evil—the Toukijin. It protected him from the powerful wave of youki, much to the irritation of the beast that had assaulted him with it.

"Quite an annoyance, that blade," hissed the creature.

"It was forged of a fang powerful enough to shatter the Tetsusaiga," the taiyoukai retorted, "did you really think that a simple Kaze no Kizu would be able to scratch it?"

"Only a blind fool wouldn't see that the Tetsusaiga that I wield is on an entirely different level from the blunt scrap metal forged of the fang of a youkai too weak to beat even that lump of stone, Ryukotsusei," it growled.

"Insult the one who lowered himself to take part in your birth in the first place?" Sesshomarou said heatedly. With a swing of his sword, a burst of energy made its way at his opponent, with every intention of destroying him completely.

It illuminated the stripes across Inuyasha's cheeks, and as his mouth widened into a feral grin, his elongated fangs gleaned in the light.

"_Bakouryuha!_" He roared, deflecting the energy with the power of the Kaze no Kizu and sent a hoarde of bright blue whirlwhinds at the taiyoukai.

Sesshomarou was not prepared for this—Tetsusaiga had never been strong enough to reflect the Souryuha attack. Instinctively, he held out Toukijin for protection.

The sword forged of evil's fang, the fierce fighting diety, met the power of the Bakouryuha, and after a moment of resistance, shattered into a thousand pieces. Leaving its master vulnerable to the whirlwinds that threatened to consume him entirely.


End file.
